International Journal of

ADVANCED AND APPLIED SCIENCES

EISSN: 2313-3724, Print ISSN: 2313-626X

Frequency: 12
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 Volume 12, Issue 4 (April 2025), Pages: 200-212

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 Original Research Paper

The impact of discrimination on trust in government institutions: A LASSO regression analysis in the Canadian context during COVID-19

 Author(s): 

 Nihed Fezai *, Moktar Lamari

 Affiliation(s):

 École Nationale d'Administration Publique (ENAP), Université du Québec, Québec, Canada

 Full text

    Full Text - PDF

 * Corresponding Author. 

   Corresponding author's ORCID profile:  https://orcid.org/0009-0004-6439-3146

 Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

  https://doi.org/10.21833/ijaas.2025.04.022

 Abstract

This study examines the effect of discrimination on public trust in government and public servants during the COVID-19 pandemic. Using Canadian survey data collected in 2020 (N = 36,674), we apply both logistic regression and ordinary least squares (OLS) regression to analyze how discrimination related to COVID-19 influenced trust in four public institutions. Prior to running these models, we used the Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator (LASSO) method for variable selection. The findings indicate that personal experiences of discrimination significantly reduce institutional trust, particularly when discrimination occurs online, in the workplace, or during interactions with the police. However, the results also show that a strong sense of belonging—whether to Canada, a specific province or territory, or a shared community (such as speakers of the same language)—is associated with higher levels of trust in institutions. These insights provide valuable guidance for policymakers and public officials.

 © 2025 The Authors. Published by IASE.

 This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

 Keywords

 Discrimination, Institutional trust, COVID-19, Sense of belonging, Public institutions

 Article history

 Received 14 December 2024, Received in revised form 18 April 2025, Accepted 26 April 2025

 Acknowledgment

No Acknowledgment.

  Compliance with ethical standards

  Conflict of interest: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

 Citation:

 Fezai N and Lamari M (2025). The impact of discrimination on trust in government institutions: A LASSO regression analysis in the Canadian context during COVID-19. International Journal of Advanced and Applied Sciences, 12(4): 200-212

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 Figures

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 Tables

  Table 1  Table 2  Table 3  Table 4  Table 5  Table 6  Table 7  Table 8 

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